Posts Tagged ‘bush foods

The humble cabbage took a bollocking from botanist Peter Latz at the launch of a bush medicines section at Alice Springs’ community garden earlier this month. The Hermannsburg-born author of Bushfires And Bushtucker threw diplomacy to the wind as he compared the traditional plants wild-harvested by the Arrernte with the “freaks and mongrels” they will be growing alongside in Burke Street. His point, perhaps a little overstated for dramatic effect, was that we have bred much of the nutritio...Read more

Personally I think Alice Springs might be a better place to be than the beach this Christmas. You might pick up from this that I’m not actually going to the beach, but this is not sour grapes on my part. More like sweet figs, in fact. I am bewitched by the sheer fecundity of what is all around us this summer in the Centre (except perhaps for mice and grasshoppers), and the native fig I mentioned in Sunday’s post is just another Christmas bonus. The tree grows on a particularly rocky ...Read more

Dear readers: You have more than eleven days left to make an excellent bush Christmas cake. I got this recipe from Rayleen Brown of Kungkas Can Cook just a couple of days before Christmas 2009 and posted it, sadly a little late, because, after having finally made it ourselves last night, I can verify this is a truly worthwhile Christmas experience, perhaps one of the very few still available to contemporary human beings. I varied the original recipe slightly because I didn’t want to u...Read more

After this year’s Bushfood competition at the Desert Festival, I’ve commenced a self-managed apprenticeship to the masterful cooks who plied delighted festival-goers with such a plethora of tastes, textures and new ways of thinking about food this year. I began on Sunday night with a slightly bodgied version of Hujjat Nadarajah’s victorious Bushtucka Bademjoon Persian roo and eggplant stew, foregoing the Quangdong Addas Poloh persian lentil quangdong rice Hujjat served it up ...Read more

A “Larapinta Trail Mix” of dried native foods with a cordial made from quandongs and ruby saltbush berries , a bush passionfruit brulee and a classically presented high tea were the winners in a morning marked by “wonderful concepts” at the second round of the Alice Springs wildfood recipes competition. Rain drove the competition indoors to the Water Tank Cafe in Hele Crescent, and although it was made clear by entrants that the weather had had a longer-term effec...Read more

Former Alice Springs chef Miranda Sage was well-known for her culinary achievements when she lived here in years gone by … but in recent years she has gone completely wild. The evidence is her Totally Wild Terrine, Salad and Pickles, which won Miranda equal first prize in the Alice Springs Desert Festival’s Wild Bushfoods Recipe Competition. That made it two years in a row for Miranda, who last year entered an equally beautifully presented Bushman’s Bag and Swag. It’s onl...Read more

Rainbow Valley is best known world-wide for its colourful, other-worldly sandstone escarpments. But in decades to come it may also be remembered as the place where an Australian fruit first discovered thousands of years ago moved on to another level. Bush tomatoes are one of the celebrities of the bush tucker world. Mostly used in specialty seed and spice mixes, sauces and chutneys, their journey onto the world’s tabletops is in its infancy, and is likely to be shaped by two things: the im...Read more

Rayleen Brown, the genius behind Alice Springs catering firm Kungkas Can cook, came up with this magnificent and relatively easy recipe for a Bush Christmas Cake. The fact is it'll be Christmas whenever you cook it. You’ll need dried quandongs, lemon myrtle and wattle seed for the bush part - but Rayleen says it’s OK to cheat a little....Read more

Many of us are closet foragers - or have been foragers as children. Why is it that we have been convinced that the only food worth picking comes off a supermarket shelf. Bush products researcher Ange Vincent likes to forage for her food - and in arid Alice Springs it's amazing what she can find on an early morning stroll around the neighbourhood....Read more

Ruth Morley snatched triumph from disaster when her ruby saltbush sorbet plans went awry only days before she was due to enter the dish in the 2009 Bush Foods Recipe competition. She went back to the pantry, decided less was more, and was surprised to discover that her revised recipe actually worked . At the Foodies Finale of the competition, a feature of the annual Alice Desert Festival, the first-time entrant was even more surprised to discover she had won not only best sweet but also best ove...Read more

‘What’s that jolly jumbuck you’ve got in your tucker bag?” “Well, actually, officer, it’s not a jumbuck. It’s … well it’s a bit more complicated than that …’’ “Sure, tell that to the judges.’’ There was no need for Miranda Sage to jump in the billabong after she presented her dish at this year’s Bush foods Recipe Competition. In fact, the judges were so impressed by the contents of her tucker bag they gave her first prize for best savoury dish. Miranda de...Read more

ou’re never too young to appreciate bush foods – and maybe youth is an advantage when it comes to valuing the treasures that grow all around us. Rhodanthe Collins’ ruby juice was a source of considerable excitement for the under-10s at this year’s Bush Foods Recipe Competition (2009). Ruby is pictured here with Bush Foods co-ordinator Rebecca Goodenham...Read more